You know, for all the shit everyone is giving the ad, I approve of it. Call it distasteful, but it accomplishes the desired message: it's elegant, wrapped in fine black material. You want to touch the front screen, but there is even more of the same on the back. All of Sony's strong ads are always weird and provocative, but they communicate exactly what they want to tell you.

Jesus christ. Takes balls to run an advert like that though. Considering the advert series for the Sony portable stuff so far... shows they have them.

I've never really liked sony's ads, even beyond the really offensive ones. Kind of hated the whole Kevin Butler thing. But I still really love that ad. It's amazing. PSP, it's like cheese you can listen to outside.

@Animasta: It is creepy, but I can not decide if it's better or worse than. Both are pretty terrible.

The hysterically stupid thing about the reaction those ads, is that if they showed a white woman manhandling a black lady, we say its racist against blacks (depicts black people as weak). If it was a black woman manhandling a white lady, we'd say it's racist against blacks (depicts black people as abusive). There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind.

I also think outrage at the silly four-boobs picture is just puritans going "what, sexual desire being real? Ban them!!"

There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind.

It's not that they're interacting, it's the implication that one is superior over another. You can absolutely have advertisements where whites & blacks interact without being an asshole and having people react:

There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind.

It's not that they're interacting, it's the implication that one is superior over another. You can absolutely have advertisements where whites & blacks interact without being an asshole and having people react:

If the roles are reversed, people would still claim it's racially insensitive to black people. Either way you set up the roles, it's 'portraying blacks' as victims or abusers, because the mere act of including any minority group qualifies a representation of an entire social group to some people. I hate that, that just leads to tokenism.

The defense of "but it's the acts involved" is the same nonsense that said Resident Evil 5 is racist because it features a white guy shooting black people (or X modern military is racist because it's white and black troops shooting middle eastern people). It ignores established context for projected political context. Everyone wants to construct narratives where "this is what they really think!" but do you really think it's using people to symbolize the awesome new PSP, or that Sony is making a statement about race relations? Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

The hysterically stupid thing about the reaction those ads, is that if they showed a white woman manhandling a black lady, we say its racist against blacks (depicts black people as weak). If it was a black woman manhandling a white lady, we'd say it's racist against blacks (depicts black people as abusive). There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind. I also think outrage at the silly four-boobs picture is just puritans going "what, sexual desire being real? Ban them!!"

I'm not sure who the 'we' is in your statement but I'd like to not be included in that group.

The hysterically stupid thing about the reaction those ads, is that if they showed a white woman manhandling a black lady, we say its racist against blacks (depicts black people as weak). If it was a black woman manhandling a white lady, we'd say it's racist against blacks (depicts black people as abusive). There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind. I also think outrage at the silly four-boobs picture is just puritans going "what, sexual desire being real? Ban them!!"

I'm not sure who the 'we' is in your statement but I'd like to not be included in that group.

In this case, 'we' is the whole, stupid, knee-jerk human race. I obviously wouldn't want to be included either.

The thing is, I'd agree it has Unfortunate Implications, but that doesn't cross the line into Actual Racism. The implications are kind of amusing in the "bet you didn't think of it that way, Sony" but people going "this means you guys actually hate black folk blahhhh" are whacked.

@Brodehouse: I wasn't arguing that people don't see racism where this is none intended. I was just arguing that what you said, "There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind," isn't true.

@Brodehouse: I wasn't arguing that people don't see racism where this is none intended. I was just arguing that what you said, "There is no way to have an ad where a white person and a black person interact without people losing their mind," isn't true.

Absolutely, sure. Perhaps i overreached in my speaking. Apologies. But in this particular case it kind of shows people looking at their own insecurities and their own political correctness rather than the context of the ad. The first thing I thought when I saw it a few years ago is "that's offensive to black people" but then I thought about if you flipped it and realized I was projecting onto it. Now that specific ad is my favourite example of knee-jerk PC reactions.